'App economy' takes hold

Corporate July 18, 2014 00:00

By JIRAPAN BOONNOON

The Natio

2,925 Viewed

The application economy is a new trend for information technology, driving the "Internet of Things", mobility and the digital lifestyle, said Chua I-Pin, vice president for Asia South at CA Technologies.

"Application economy or apps economy will be the key trend for business. The three main trends are [have] important roles to drive business and information-technology infrastructure to support business," he said.

Chua said CA Technologies, a major software company headquartered in the United States, aimed to provide its solutions to support this new era of business. Today there are 26 apps for smartphones and 2.3 million application developers. By 2017 there will be five connected devices per person and about 4.4 billion app users.

In its global study "The Changing Role of IT and What to Do about It", the firm found that chief information officers in the Asia-Pacific Japan (APJ) region led the world in viewing IT as "very strategically important" or "fundamental" to business.

The study also confirmed what many in the industry have suspected: As the role of IT is increasingly seen as supporting business, the IT spend is growing within other lines of business.

More than one-third (36 per cent) of IT spend is now happening outside of the IT department in APJ organisations. This clearly demonstrates the transformation of technology from a centrally managed IT responsibility to corporate-wide business enabler and redefines how technology is purchased, deployed and used. And, within three years, the amount of IT spending controlled by lines of business is expected to swell to 45 per cent.

The change of IT’s role to become an enabler of business is in some respects still at the nascent state in the region, pointing to further opportunities for growth and transformation.

The study reveals that activities such as developing new, innovative products and services (13 per cent) and driving new business initiatives (21 per cent) are not top of mind with most IT departments in APJ.

Moreover, the survey also reported that cloud computing (53 per cent), mobility (36 per cent), and business intelligence and analytics (33 per cent) are seen by APJ respondents as the three biggest trends affecting IT at present.

A total of 52 per cent say IT needs to provide more training on these new technologies, and 44 per cent say IT needs to align more closely with business to understand these key priorities.

Suthas Wongwisekkul, general manager of CA Solutions (Thailand), said this country had 20 million smartphone users, up from 15.3 million last year.